Thursday, May 14, 2009

One semester down, 3 more to go

So I did it! I made it through my first semester of Nursing school. I can now officially take vital signs, give injections, make beds (with people in them :) ), give enemas, check blood sugar, do a full health assessment (basically a full physical), feed people, do wound care/packing, put in an NG tube, move people with a gait belt or hoyer lift, do sterile gloving, put on ostomy bags, and give oral medication. Obviously I still need a lot more practice, but I am getting there. Now I have a lovely 2 week break before I start up again for summer. Whew! No rest for the weary! I've really enjoyed Nursing school so far though. It's interesting to me, that at first I thought this was what nursing school is all about, learning the skills. But since I've been in school, the focus has been more on realizing the whole of what nursing is which includes communicating, educating and caring with compassion. It's been really cool, and I've really enjoyed what I've been learning so far. Before I had always just wanted to get through to become a nurse practitioner, now I've realized that nursing really is a cool career. So who knows, I will still probably go on, but I am enjoying this for now.

Look at me in action. I am teaching the class how to perform an abdominal exam

Here is my lovely group, P4. And yes, that is a testicle model that Christy is holding up in front. For our first Health Assessment we had to teach the class we got the lovely topic of Breast/Abdomen/Testicular. Haha. Luckily I got to teach the Abdomen portion

Hey my little miss. Wow look at you go, you are so grown up and all "nursey-ish." All I do is examine dead bodies these days. Your job looks way funner. Well, love you girl and when you check this in like 2 years I just wanted to say hey.